.

I wasn't sure if I was going to do another sonogram... I don't think I really *needed* one, per se. They recommended a follow-up after my first scan, but apparently that is just routine. Nothing was abnormal or anything.

But, for me.. I was still in a state of disbelief that there really is an actual baby-sized baby in my belly. I look down at myself and I just look and feel so BIG... it's like, where's the baby? Even with all the kicking. Even with being able to look down and see my belly jiggling from her kicking and moving inside me. Even with all that, it still wasn't real to me. In my head, baby was still a teensy little four month old fetus. Not really a BABY, yet.

Well, we decided to go, and it was today, and it was amazing. Amazing. This technology is just phenomenal. That they can just touch me, and up pops my baby's face, right there, just like that. Amazing!!!!

She is fine. She is perfect. She was moving, opening her mouth, blinking her little eyes, squirming around. I could feel the movement inside of me while watching her move on the screen. She was head down, but sort of diagonal, and had her hands both up in front of her face, like a little boxer. She smiled! Honestly she is just perfect.

Tears were leaking out my eyes while I watched the screen, I just couldn't help it. The whole thing is such an incomprehensible miracle. No matter how much I may *know* about babies (having been doing sooooo much research!), or anything else... that there is a baby inside of me is still just... astonishing!

The fact that MY body, which I've always viewed with more than a little contempt, could create something so perfect... well that is even more astonishing. For the first time in my life, I feel proud of my body. Years and years of shame over my weight are completely overwhelmed by the fact that my body is making this perfect little person, and all I have to do is allow it to do its work. Millions and billions of tiny little cells knowing just where to go, just what to do, creating the placenta, feeding the baby, helping her grow, getting my breasts ready to feed her, getting my pelvis ready to birth her, all this going on at once... and going RIGHT.

All along I feel like I've just been waiting for something to go wrong. Not that I would lose my baby!!! But that I would have all kinds of problems, as most of my friends have had. That I'd wind up with exactly what I don't want, a medicalized pregnancy leading to a birth full of interventions because my body MUST be broken.

Well, it's just... NOT. Everything is working. Everything is growing exactly as it should. I feel like I've gained a little too much weight, but my body apparently knows exactly what is needed to care for this little girl in my belly. So maybe I'll be able to quiet my worries, and trust myself and my body a little bit, for the very first time in my life. Surrender to the process. Be at peace.

I can't wait to meet my little girl!